TOP 10 REASONS WHY WOMEN SHOULD VOTE - #1

- In the 90th anniversary year of the ratification of the 19th Amendment to the Constitution, is there any better way that we could celebrate - THAN TO VOTE !!!!!

TOP 10 REASONS WHY WOMEN SHOULD VOTE - #2

- despite arrests and violent treatment in prison, women continued to picket the White House during 1917, until President Woodrow Wilson agreed to support the "right to vote amendment." Remember these women and their courage. VOTE TOMORROW!

TOP 10 REASONS WHY WOMEN SHOULD VOTE - #3

- in a country where we can travel to the polls and vote in perfect safety, it is silly not to!

TOP 10 REASONS WHY WOMEN SHOULD VOTE - #4

- in the 72 years it took to achieve the right to vote many invested blood sweat and tears. Remember them as you vote on Tuesday.

TOP 10 REASONS WHY WOMEN SHOULD VOTE - #5

- It is completely non-fattening to vote on Tuesday!

TOP 10 REASONS WHY WOMEN SHOULD VOTE - #6

- There is a lot at stake. Weigh in and VOTE!!!

TOP 10 REASONS WHY WOMEN SHOULD VOTE - #7

- It is something you can do completely on your own, with no one looking over your shoulder!

TOP 10 REASONS FOR WOMEN TO VOTE - #8

It is more fun than paying taxes! - of the 2 responsibilities we have as citizens.

TOP 10 REASONS FOR WOMEN TO VOTE - #9

- YOU CAN INFLUENCE the makeup of your Congressional District for the next TEN years by who you vote for.

TOP 10 REASONS WHY WOMEN SHOULD VOTE - #10

- It is a stake in YOUR future!

COURTED BY PRESIDENTS, Part 3

At the age of 2, Jane Addams lost her mother. At 4 she contracted tuberculosis of the spine, which caused a curvature in her spine and health problems the rest of her life. She was inspired by those who worked with the poor and wanted to be a doctor. After graduating from nearby Rockford Female Seminary at 21, her father died. The following fall, she along with her sister Alice, her husband and their step mother went to Philadelphia so the 3 young people could attend medical school. They only managed a year before the step mother’s health required them to return home.
The next year, her brother in law, already a doctor, did surgery to improve her spine. She traveled for 2 years and then returned home, struggling to find focus for her life. She strongly resisted the expectation that the role for all women was to marry and devote their lives to their family, as set forth by John Stuart Mill, in his book “The Subjection of Women.”
She'd had a nervous breakdown after her father’s death and at this point she struggled with depression. But reading had always given her strength. She became a Christian at 26, and set about exploring how religion and her interests might enable a life worthy of her. It took three years, but when she came home from Europe, she knew where her life was headed.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jane_Addams

COURTED BY PRESIDENTS, Part 2

Jane Addams,of Hull House, was the first President of a group called the International Women's Congress for Peace and Freedom, organized in 1915 to call for suffrage for women, and mediation to bring about the end of wars. At “their 2nd international congress, held in Zürich in 1919, ICWPP denounced the final terms of the peace treaty ending World War I as a scheme of revenge of the victors over the vanquished that would sow the seeds of another world war.”
The group moved to Zurich to work with the new League of Nations, and changed their name to Women's International League for Peace and Freedom. It was because of this work that Jane Addams was the first woman to receive the Nobel Peace Prize in 1931.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Women%27s_International_League_for_Peace_and_Freedom

COURTED BY PRESIDENTS, Part 1

An avid reader from childhood and scholar in many fields, Jane Addams, founder of Hull House in Chicago, was a Christian, an advocate for human rights, and could hold her own in local, national and international affairs.
“Addams worked with labor as well as other reform groups toward goals including the first juvenile-court law, tenement-house regulation, an eight-hour working day for women, factory inspection, and workers' compensation. She advocated research aimed at determining the causes of poverty and crime, and supported women's suffrage. She was a strong advocate of justice for immigrants and blacks, becoming a charter member of the NAACP. Among the projects that the members of the Hull House opened were the Immigrants' Protective League, the Juvenile Protective Association, the first juvenile court in the United States, and a Juvenile Psychopathic Clinic.”
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jane_Addams

HOW DO YOU KEEP FIT?

Tomorrow is National Women’s Health and Fitness Day.

It is the “9th annual event to promote the value of health and fitness for women of all ages,” according to answers.com If you are not doing anything on a regular basis, maybe it’s the opportunity to start.

http://www.examiner.com/healthy-living-in-richmond/national-womens-health-and-fitness-day-is-september-29-2010

BALANCE IN MARRIAGE Part 2

In the 19th century, there was a full spectrum of marriages from ones where the wives were literally servants, needing to account for every minute of their time and little more than sexual slaves, to husbands like Elizabeth Cady Stanton’s who were loving and supportive, a real partner to thei...r wives in every sense of the word.The suffragists, who knew they were fortunate in their lives, were fighting for the improvement of the lives of the “marriage slaves” or others only slightly better off. They were fighting for the right of women to make decisions about their own lives, not just the right to vote.

BALANCE IN MARRIAGE Part 1

In the 19th century, there was lots of tension and even fear among both men and women over the idea of changing the balance between men's and women's roles in marriage. Men feared the loss of control over their households and thus their lives. Women feared the freedom and thus the loss of structure, routine and ultimately security that might come with change.
So it was that women fighting for women's rights found themselves fighting against women as well as men. Perhaps some saw their less than equal lives as the price they had to pay for security and the right to be able to bring up their own children. It was not a legal foregone conclusion that their mother should care for them. Men had all the rights and final say over their children's lives and how they were raised. At the time there were cases of men, who could afford child care arrangements, throwing out their wives and preventing her children from seeing her ever again.

WHO IS GOOD ENOUGH?

In an editorial linked below, Wm. M. King reminds us of how elusive our freedom can be. Frederick Douglass reminded his listeners that even though the Constitution had been ratified in 1788, we were no closer as a nation in 1852 to making true the enterprise that “all men are created equal.”
That of course also included women. It took many more years to accomplish these goals and yet we forget the long time and much effort that it required. So when another situation of discrimination comes along we need the reminders of the past to help us deal with the present.
As we hear of hatred in the news pertaining to new religious and national prejudice, we must all remember we are inheritors of our freedoms and therefore we can only be humbly grateful for them and be willing to be generous with what we did not earn.

http://www.boulderweekly.com/article-2887-the-myth-of-a-post-racial-america.html

WOMEN AND LEISURE TIME IN EARLY 1800’S

Those who lived in cities and towns might work a 10 hour day for 6 days a week. Then at home there was a full complement of household chores including cleaning, cooking, shopping for food, and making and repairing clothing. Sunday was the only relief in long hours of work, and that had its own requirements for those in God fearing households. Along with attending worship, there were people who were sick or in need in other ways to visit. Those in authority in the communities knew there was little likelihood of crime. Women had no time to be independent or worry about their rights.

Lizzie Stanton and other suffragists had a hard time ahead of them to convince most women that things could be different.

RULE THE AIR

I usually resist marketing ploys, but there is an ad out there that impresses me, not for the product but the young women’s presence. It is for a prominent cell phone carrier. The message it carries puts forth the idea that these young women want to excel at what they do, and that is always a good idea. I cannot quote, but it begins with the idea that Air has no prejudice; it doesn’t care about your age, sex or color. Then it gets better by talking about how their words can be powerful if they are wise, infectious if they are worthy, and can lead an army that will follow. WHAT A THING FOR YOUNG WOMEN TO ASPIRE TO!
Words can be very powerful, especially if they are precise. I pray that is an idea we could regain!

http://phones.verizonwireless.com/ruletheair/#/landing

ANNE HUTCHINSON DARED TO SPEAK HER MIND

Her greatest crime in 1637 seems to have been that she had an opinion – first about her faith, and second concerning an ecclesiastical hot topic of the day. As a minister’s daughter, she must have been better educated than most of the women in her weekly discussion group, and could do biblical exegesis as well as most ministers. This probably gave her the confidence to express informed opinions on church matters that ultimately got her banished from Massachusetts. She was accused of renouncing her traditional role of woman, and usurping the role of husband, magistrate and minister – roles reserved ONLY for men.

Hutchinson, Ann, Trials Of - Founding Mothers and Fathers, Making Heretics: The Free Grace Controversy In Massachusetts, 1636–1639